The Forge Archives

I know I haven't designed anything new since Urge - I've been lazy. So, I decided to start finishing my projects. The first finished:

Donjon Krawl (http://www.acid-reflex.com/rpg/donjon/), a (hopefully) incredibly Gamist romp through some old territory. It's meant to be deceptive - the rules seem standard until you finally realize what all you can do with them. This is, more than anything, so I don't frighten off the people that might try this instead of D&D one night.

This is a playtest version of the rules, and as such, may have mistakes, errors, things left out, broken pieces of my heart, and other things in it. I wrote 4,500 words of it yesterday, so they may be wonky. Please feel free to point anything like this out.

My eventual goal for this is to actually print and sell it. I'll sell it in some fashion, whether it be PDF or print - but either way, it'll exist at GenCon this year. Your input is greatly desired. Thanks!

Clinton R. Nixon
http://www.acid-reflex.com

Clinton,

Looks like we got a Missing Link situation here ...

Best,
Ron

The link is the title above, but to repeat it: http://www.acid-reflex.com/rpg/donjon/.

Absolutely fantastic.  I want to play this game right now.  Any console RPG game from Shining Force to Zelda would be perfect adventure fodder for a Donjon Krawl game.

Couple of quick notes:

1) My personal bias:  too much humor in a game tends to make players think of it as a lark to play rather than a "real" game.  Since you made a point to mention that the game started out as satire but now its not, you may want to dial down the "crazy mad Ninja Speed" type stuff to something more "traditional".  On the other hand its perfectly funny for a satire.

2) The 3d6 thing for stats converted to dice.  Absolutely see the point of this in a satirical game.  Its the modifier thats important, the stat is totally useless and kept for old times sake (just like D&D3E).  However, if this game really isn't a satire but really is a "legitimate" FRPG...I'd lose the 3d6 to mod conversion and just go with the mods.

3) Why have the monsters use different creation methods than the players.  4 Level Dice per level seems pretty straight forward.  A Level 5 monster would thus be exactly equal in total dice spent to a Level 5 character.  Might also help with the OMG note for the Undead Crocs.

4) Early on you describe the Narrative use for player successes.  Consider tieing this in more to the Adventures Chapter.  For example, the players could (I assume) a narrative success to simply discover an entrance to the ancient temple and skip over the entire swamp encounter.  Some examples of this use in the adventures chapter would be good.

Holy cow this would be a fun game to play.

Valamir,

About the other things:
1) Serious vs. Silly - That's more Clinton's ballpark, as it's his baby. But Clinton and I are probably meeting on Sunday to hash out a bunch of this stuff.

2) We talked about the 3d6 thing and mods, and decided that we really needed the numbered stats. It really makes the game feel like old-school + new-school.

3) & 4) I can't talk about these as I haven't read the newest draft yet. Yikes!!

Valamir,

Thanks for the compliments - I really appreciate it. Answers to your queries:

1) I know - the text is scattered in tone. Part of it's written as a satire, part of it is serious, and part of it is just right off the cuff. The "real" version of it will be cleaned up and more serious, with wicked humor under the hood.

2) I'd drop the 3d6 thing, too. This sort of thing happens with co-contributors. :) Honestly, Zak was so insistent, I couldn't drop it. The one thing it does work for is advancement - it slows ability score growth down.

3) This was just a mistake, I think. I wrote the monster creation off the top of my head. The math will be fixed here - if you change "8 + (4 dice x Level)" to "12 + (4 dice x Level)," it should be the exact same method.

4) I need to tie all this together more - I think you're correct in that. I plan to write a complete example of play for the finished print version that will cover this. Basically, players can use their narrative successes all they want, but since the DM is left to narrate with their facts, he can thwart skipping of this nature. An example:

Player: I'm looking around for a secret door.
GM: In the middle of the swamp?
Player: Well, the temple door might be hidden in the ground or under moss or something.
GM: Ok.
Player: I got 2 successes. I'm using them both for facts:
- I find a slab of marble in the ground.
- It has ancient runes of Nok on it.
GM: Alright. You find this slab of marble with runes in it. Do you try to move it aside?
Player: Yep.
GM: It moves easily, and you see a hole underneath filled with water. A skull bobs to the top. (GM can start a pre-planned encounter here.)

There will be times where this might be hard to do - keeping characters in one step. Part of this is just the contract between the DM and players, but the bigger part of it is that it actually is a contest for the DM to keep the players where he wants them. They have the power to manipulate stuff, so he has to stay on his guard.

See - I was able to work a problem into functional Gamism. Rock on. :)

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
2) I'd drop the 3d6 thing, too. This sort of thing happens with co-contributors. :) Honestly, Zak was so insistent, I couldn't drop it. The one thing it does work for is advancement - it slows ability score growth down.

Hee, I also insisted on Virility. I kind of like the arguments that happen when co-designinng. The give and take is a lot of fun. I can't remember which of us is resposible for each stat name, but there was much debate.

I'm seeing Donjon Krawl as being picked up by indie gamers and traditional gamers alike. Traditional gamers will see things like:
a) Familiar stat break down
b) Weapon & Armor charts (Clinton, maybe the charts should be big and unweildy, but just be an extension of the little chart you've got? Just an idea)
c) Examples of dungeon crawling

Indie gamers will see:
a) Dice pool mechanic (hey, like Sorcerer!)
b) Fun reminders of early gaming (I assume that most indie gamers used to play/still play the more traditional games)
c) Examples of story-telling

Heh, I love the stat names...except for Wherewithal...that one is a bit much of a mouthful for me.  But Adoit, Discernment, et.al.  good words and a subtle stab at games that shamelessly copied the D&D six but just changed the terms.

As far as the 3d6 thing...I'll make the following two comments, which are after all just personal opinion based on a first read.

1) Ars Magica is also an old time RPG but its stats are on a +/- 5 scale and have been for several editions.  Thus, you can still be "old school" without being 3d6.

2) I understand the game started out as an attempt to take a good old fashion dungeon hack and slip hidden "new school" design elements in unnoticed...but I REALLY think the game stands up well on it own merits as a game.  I wouldn't worry too much about (if it were me) about the Old vs New thing at this point...I'd say the game's grown beyond those initial goals.  If there is a game reason for keeping it that way (and there's no other way of handling the slowing advancement issue) then go with it.  But if its there primarily to be a tip of the hat to "old school" play...it may be too heavy handed.


BTW:  If you do decide to go with a more "serious" tone to the game you may want to consider shortening the title from Donjon Krawl to Donjon.  IMO, Donjon is just a kick ass word,  Donjon Krawl still sounds satirical.


Did I mention I really want to play this game...now I only need to find a group.  I have no one to play with out here in Peoria.

Ohhh, and I just had an idea.  You mention that traditional scenario design will be kind of impossible given the free wheeling narrativist power of the players.

But one staple of old school fantasy gaming that might be quite useable is the random encounter table.

This could be expanded into a whole random scenario generator.  I'm envisioning a Flow Chart design (with all the boxes and triangles and branching arrows and such) with each symbol on the flow chart tieing to a table.  

Start: <clatter of dice>  You're in an old mining camp now largely deserted <clatter of dice> all Resources are low but so is the markup.

etc. etc.

There could even be a random monster generator complete with one of those tables of names yielding combinations like "Dire Hell Wolves" for a more serious game or "Ferocious Mutated Monkey Zombies" for a more humorous one.  Then random up some stats, levels, and skill options and voila a totally unique opponent.

You could even allow Player Successes to be used to call for rolls on certain tables.

Maybe an idea for a supplement...Donjon: The Tome of Tables.

First, Valamir, let me say that I like your ideas. Very cool. Expect to see some random city tools and the like on the site soon.

Quick note, though:

Ohhh, and I just had an idea. You mention that traditional scenario design will be kind of impossible given the free wheeling narrativist power of the players.

Oh, no. There's nothing at all narrativist about Donjon Krawl. The players hold a lot of authorial power, but that's different. The authorial power is used to compete with the DM and each other to describe encounters to their advantage.

You're right, of course, I allowed my self to get sloppy with vocabulary

I always wanted to see a D&D clone that just dumped attribute names and went with Attribute A, B, C, D, E and F. Then it hit me: Donjon Krawl could do this and get away with it. The key is that the players can just make up their own attribute names. Since the numbers all appear to be derived values anyway, this could work without being confusing (plus it meshes well with the "make your own class" concept).

Oh man, and those pictures are the best. I love the masked mallet man!

This is a great game and I wanna play it at GenCon (or sooner, dammit).

- J

Postcrypt: oh yeah, you could replace the "Other Items (inn rooms, food, travel, etc) " tag in the town descriptions with "Hospitality."

Ok, read through the site again and have a few more queries...primarily about combat.

1) The "combat round ends after the 20-1 countdown" rule.  My first reaction was "pretty cool, all kinds of 'hurry up and kill this thing before the combat ends' kind of thinking evolves from that.  In fact, that tied directly into to alot of combat oriented console RPG games where you fight for a couple of turns and the screen fades and you're done until the next game turn.

BUT...how do you implement this in actual play.  In a table top RPG as opposed to a machine based one players will often demand justifications from a GM that they'd just accept as the "way the game is" from an electronic GM.

Does the combat ending mean the bad guys got away?  Does it mean the animated skeletons ran out of juice and fell apart? Is is up to the players to decide what it means?  What exactly does "the players decide to continue it" mean?  What if they are getting completely whooped up on and don't want to continue...why would the bad guys suddenly stop coming?  Maybe some examples of how you'd use a "time limit" in this way to end the combat.


2) Active vs passive defense...in general it looks like sacrificing an action allows you to get combat skill+adroitness instead of just adroitness to defend with.  Does the defender have to declare this in advance or can they roll adroitness and after seeing the result decide to sacrifice an action?  It sounds like its declared in advance, but its not explicit.  

But sometimes you can add a Dodge skill to even a passive defense.  If a character actually possesses a Dodge skill that anywhere close to the level of his combat skill it would seem that such a character would almost always be better off not actively defending.  If so, this may be one of those obnoxious min/max type situations where EVERY fighter decides to take a dodge skill.

What may help here is the secondary skill rule.  I would assume that "dodge" would be unacceptable, but "Dodge Sword" would be required.  Which would limit the Dodge utility somewhat, but what about an attempt to just say "Dodge blow".  It may not help dodging a run away wagon, but is still pretty broad.  Or the inevitable "I want to use my acrobatics skill to dodge the attack"...

Also FYI the text of this section needs a little clean up, specifically the part where a player "must have an available action to actively *dodge*" and then later Dodging is said to be passive.


3) Hit Dice and skill wounds.  Successes from damage rolls can be used to reduce the target's hit dice or reduce skill dice (and presumeably attribute dice).  This is another rule that made great sense on first read but now I'm having a little trouble with.  

It seems to me that leaving this choice up to the players results in one of 3 possible choices.
a) the player will ALWAYS target Hit Dice because that is the only way to kill the bad guy (or to render him unconcious and nearly dead for capturing purposes).
b) Only for REALLY tough monsters (or those with alot of attack actions) would it be beneficial to soften them up first with skill hits and this would almost certainly be limited to either Wherewithal hits to make them easier to damage or Adroitness hits to make them easier to hit and reduce the chances of being hit.  Damage to other areas would in most circumstance be less effective that this.
c) Only players interested in "letting the bad guy get away" or "leaving the villain something to remember me by" or other such tangental purposes would reduce skills etc...  If the goal is to "kill the monster" as is the case with 90% of dungeon crawling I think a & b are likely to be the case.

Related to this are the DM's choices for damage against the players.  Since monsters are somewhat disposable, the only real reason for a DM to damage a player's stats rather than try to kill them out right with HD hits would be to *not* kill them out right with HD hits.  This stands to bring the same sort of negative thoughts as "fudging die rolls" to save a characters life in many "traditional" gamers.

I can think of 2 possible "solutions" (I put solutions in " " because you may not see the above as a problem)...perhaps alternatives is a better word.

I.  the choice of hitting HD or Skills is not up to the player or DM but rather is either a) random for each success or b) tied to the die type.  In the random category "even" successes might be HD hits while "odd" successes might require the player to choose a Skill hit.  Alternatively, dice of a different color could be used to distinguish weapon dice from skill dice.  Weapon Dice might always be HD hits and Skill Dice always Skill Hits, or for non lethal weapons Weapon Dice might be Skill Hits and Skill Dice give a choice.

II.  Define an effect for HD that is different for Skills, perhaps making MORE HDs.  Meaning if 3 Success will Kill a monster I wouldn't waste 2 of them reducing its Wherewithal.    BUT if it took 12 Successes to kill a monster and I only have 2, starting by reducing Wherewithal might be a better strategy.

Further, with regards to healing, you mention that players get a die back with each new location.  What if instead, HD came back with each player Action (or perhaps an Action could be sacrificed "resting" to get 1d6 HD back or something similiar).  Skill hits on the other hand Linger.  Thus, a DM isn't necessarily doing the player any favors by hitting him with a Skill Hit that will linger as opposed to a HD hit that can be recovered quickly.


4) Specifically with regards to healing, the healing rules seem rather generous.  I don't mean from a simulationist perspective, which clearly they aren't, but from a game perspective.  Many of my most memorable dungeon hack moments are when we're way deep down, out of healing potions, the clerics burned his last Cure X Wounds and most of the Tanks are at 1/2 HPs.  Seems to me (unless the DM is very forceful in not having many "filler scenes") that the current rule is potentially regenerative.

In the interests of keeping it simple and tying it in with the above, perhaps it is HD hits that recover quickly but Skill hits only come back 1 die per "dungeon level"...as in "ok you've left the swamp and are entering the first level of the temple, everyone regain 1 skill die".

Just some things I came across as I began thinking about how I'd actually run a game.

Valamir,

Great, great questions. Here's my attempted answers.

1) Does the combat ending mean the bad guys got away?  Does it mean the animated skeletons ran out of juice and fell apart? Is is up to the players to decide what it means?  What exactly does "the players decide to continue it" mean?  What if they are getting completely whooped up on and don't want to continue...why would the bad guys suddenly stop coming?

Here's how I envision this sort of situation. Most combats come in "waves." The good guys and bad guys clash for a minute, tearing into each other and then stop and breathe before smashing into each other again. The end of the initiative countdown represents this. It's not that everyone gets away or all the enemies fall apart as much as the moment where either side can go "that's about all I want of that business."

I need to add some rules for getting away. If the players decide, "Screw this noise" and try to run, and the DM decides the monsters want to press the combat, I'd call for an Adroitness + pertinent skill (Run, for example) roll versus the monsters' Adroitness. (I'd compare all the players' rolls against the best monster roll. Anyone with successes can get away, anyone without is back in the grinder.)

2) You must declare active or passive defense when attacked.

But sometimes you can add a Dodge skill to even a passive defense.  If a character actually possesses a Dodge skill that anywhere close to the level of his combat skill it would seem that such a character would almost always be better off not actively defending.  If so, this may be one of those obnoxious min/max type situations where EVERY fighter decides to take a dodge skill.[/red]

The problem with this is the limit on skills. Anyone who wants to be a fighter-type can take a Dodge skill, but they also need a Fighting skill, might want a damaging skill, and might want a skill to get more actions in combat. You run out of options fast. Still, you might take, for example:

Beating Things up with Weapons
Laying Down the Smack with Swords (damage)
Whirling Blades (adds to initiative in combat with a sword)
Dodge Hand-to-Hand Attacks
Intimidate Humans

In this case, it's up to the DM to balance this with encounters. Send the characters into encounters with pits, crevices, traps, and the like. This character will rule in combat, to be sure, but will meet his match outside of it. In addition - have the opponents in combats have missile weapons or spells.

What I see as really powerful is a character with a "Dodge" main skill.

3 & 4) All your suggestions here are good in regards to damage and healing. The healing rules were written at the tail end of the 4,500 words-in-one-day stretch when I realized, "I gots no healing rules." I like the 1 Hit Die back per encounter + 1 Skill Die back per dungeon level idea, and think I will steal it liberally.

Other reasons to attack skill dice, though:

Let's say you have a monster attacking the party with an obscene attack rating. It's well worth it to knock down that attack rating early on to avoid the damage it will cause. The same applies to an opponent with powerful magic.

In addition, the rules are there for the DM in this case. If you note, I make it real hard for player characters to die. Once their Hit Dice are gone, opponents can start hacking down their skills instead of trying to kill them because (a) they have a better chance of reducing skills than killing them and (b) what the hell sort of fun is character death? I prefer player fear.

I think I'm going to change it from skill damage to ability score damage - you accidentally used the ability score names in your post, but it makes sense. In the text, I mentioned narrating an attack on a body part in order to reduce "all skills applying to that," i.e. hitting someone in the arm in order to reduce all attack skills. I think narrating an attack hitting someone on the head to reduce Cerebrality, or hitting someone in the arm to reduce Virility makes more sense, and makes the act powerful enough that people will want to use it instead of attacking Hit Dice.

1) Makes sense in that context.  Should work slick then with rules for what to do if the sides don't agree on what to do next.  Perhaps this is also a natural break for a "ok everyone recover 1 Hit Die (but not Ability Die)" rule.

2) Here's a tangental idea.  What if there was a third time of skill even more narrowly defined.  A character could trade a secondary for 2 specialized secondaries.  In other words:  Dodge Everything (main), Dodge Blows in Combat (secondary), Dodge Swords (specialized secondary).  Just a brainstorm I had when reading your reply.  May or may not have merit.

3-4) Feel free to steal as you like.

I think the change to Abilities is a good call.  Its more obvious how those items would be effected by wounds.  However, reducing Skills should still be an option.  Against that pansy little elf with the "Landscape Painting" skill, I might want to chop off a couple of fingers on his brush hand thereby reducing his skill at painting happy little clouds and bushes :-)

You may want to include an option that Total Success on a damage roll results in a permenate die loss...adds to that fear factor a little.

I thought I saw something about active defense can turn into an attack if you beat the opponent's roll.  In that case, it makes sense to always go for active defense instead of passive defense.  

As far as skill/attribute damage, I can see some really great ideas as far as,"I beat the troll until he can't fight, then question him about where he hides his treasure", or a bonus to loot.  Other, less scrupulous characters may take to slavery, using captured foes as stalking horses, cover, or extra rations ala Nethack.  

Chris

Fantastic idea, sharp lay-out. Clean mechanics--I like it.

Good tone--I'd lose the profanity (what little there is).

[rant] I'm annoyed at the constant suggestion that gamers will be "scared off" by all these "newfangled ideas." Gamers love new ideas--if they don't seem to like your ideas the fault may not lie with them. Also note: this has little to do with Donjon Krawl--but I've seen that turn of a phrase a few times in the last few days. [/rant]

Suggestions (brain dump):
1. Random dungeon generation tables. Why not? people love 'em.

2. Something I've considered but I'm not sure how to implement: when a player is primarily active in a scene, other players can get bonus dice (or whatever) by complicating matters for him. So if Joe is picking a lock on a chest, I can slip the GM a note that says "there's a glass sphere full of poison gas inside that will fall out and he'll have to catch it before it breaks"). I get a point/dice for that. Joe sees the note ... hilarity ensues (maybe?). [alternative--each player submits a whole (fiendishly) trapped encounter--secretely--and when it is discovered if the other players guess whose trap it was they get extra points and that player doesn't get any--encouraging him to keep quiet (if they guess the wrong person he gets a point and they don't)]

3. Random treasure tables. Especially with lots of inventive/humorus curses. When a horde is discovered the player who discovered it (or the one rolling high-die, or whatever) can enhance the number of "power points" in it by adding a secret number of "curse points." So we find a treasure consisting of (roll) 6 magic items. The power is (roll) 3 (so the average item is, say "good") the player--before the power roll secretly writes down +2 so it goes to 5 but two items are cursed ... something like that.

4. Random monster generation tables: especially fun if there are flow-charts and trends (the idea is that the monsters could be generated in real time so it's like "you open the door--Monster. Joe--roll for type. (wyrm), Fred roll for color (purple--breaths halucinogen gas), Kelly, roll for bio weapons (extra big horns), etc.)

I realize the game isn't necessiarily supposed to be *that* jokey. I really do think you're on to something.

-Marco

Damnit, this is cool as hell!

I only skimmed the responses, so if I tread on trodden ground I'm sorry. Actually, I only have a scant few comments to make.

1) The art is great. However, it makes it hard to read the type. If the drawings were made lighter, this would be no problem. Also, you could make the font bigger and bolder.

2) Love the whole damn system. This runs close to a game I've been "working on" using d20s as the primary tool, so I'm into it. Good job to both Clinton and Zak on this one. I wanna play.

3) I'm with the others who have suggested more tables, charts, and random-generation stuff. Pile it on.

Quick question about dice:  are ties treated the same way as in Sorcerer (reroll or find something else), or is there some other way to handle them?  

Also, in the Brief Resolution section, there's some ambiguity about when a Total Success or Failure happens.  It's clear in Sorcerer that all the winner's dice must be higher than the loser's for it to be a Total Success.  However, in Donjon Krawl, you discard tied dice, which if you read it as meaning those dice are removed from play, you could then end up with a Total Success/Failure with the dice remaining.  I don't think that's what's meant, but it can be read that way.

Beyond that, it looks really good.  I rather like the ideas involved.  Now if only my brain didn't keep wanting to add in elements of TQB like using a character Story to derive the trait-like Skills...

Quote from: DaR
Beyond that, it looks really good.  I rather like the ideas involved.  Now if only my brain didn't keep wanting to add in elements of TQB like using a character Story to derive the trait-like Skills...

Nothin wrong with that...;-)

Ok, in prepping for a hoped for DK session this weekend I came across a slight hole in the rules.  Namely Armor...no where (unless I just flat out missed it) does it say what armor actually does.

There is a brief mention of armor being rated "by the amount of damage it stops".

Ok...that leaves 3 options.
1) The armor rating could simply refer to dice the way weapons refer to dice and the armor dice could be added to the damage resistance roll.  This in not indicated in the rules as the damage resistance roll is given to be Wherewithal + Hit Dice + Skill.

2) The armor rating could simply negate successes from a successful Damage roll.  With Plate being rated a 5, that makes damageing someone virtually impossible.

3) The armor rating subtracts from the opponents damage dice

I'd put my money on Choice 1 or 3 (which are essentially the same), but that leaves a very difficult situation.

I hit, lets say I get 2 Successes and am using a standard sword type weapon (2 dice), and have a Virility of +4 (typical fighter type strength).

I would roll 8 dice for my damage.

Lets say I'm facing an opponent with 3 Hit Dice, a Wherewithal of 3, and Chain Mail.  He'd roll 9 dice to resist my damage.


I'm also not clear on why Hit Dice is added to your resistance roll at all (this might be part of the reason why you ran into frequent whiffs on damage).  Seems to me having 2 points of Wherewithal is sufficient.  The idea is not to determine IF I hit you but by how much.  Your highest roll will prevent a certain number of my damage dice from becoming damage and that's good enough for an effect.  To become very damage resistant requires then wearing heavier armor.

Tied to this monsters then would have to purchase a seperate Armor Rating rather than rely on Hit Dice to reflect natural armor.  This might be a good thing given your comments about monsters dishing out serious whooping (it would spread their dice around making them incrementally weaker).


Idea:  Vir + Whe modifier = Carry Capacity (every old school game needs one of these).

Encomberance =
Armor Rating +
Weapon Rating (fatigue factor for swinging big heavy weapons) +
1/10 Provision Save +
1/10 Wealth Save (if carrying your gold with you) +
1 per Wealth Die of loot found in item form in dungeon.

Choice 1 it is. At least, that's how we played it out this weekend. It's the simplest method, and seems to work fine.

So, to roll Damage you roll:

Attacker's Vir + Skill + Weapon vs. Defender's Whe + Skill + Armor

We did notice that a PC/Monster with Attack, Damage and Dodge skills is super-super deadly. But then, it'd be hard for me to give up a skill like "Spot Trouble" for "Dodge blades."

(Clinton, maybe combat skills should be limited ... like instead of "Somersault out of trouble," it's "Somersault out of pointy danger."? Just a thought. We limit Attack skills to one weapon (sort-of ... I got away with Rapier & Main Gauche as one weapon) ...)

Quote from: Zak Arntson
Choice 1 it is. At least, that's how we played it out this weekend. It's the simplest method, and seems to work fine.

So, to roll Damage you roll:

Attacker's Vir + Skill + Weapon vs. Defender's Whe + Skill + Armor

That makes sense, and is how I'd do it.  The rules currently have
Defenders Whe + Skill + Hit Dice.  

I will substitute Armor for Hit Dice if I get a chance to run the game this weekend.

Oops! My bad. It's:

Defender's Whe + Skill + Hit Dice + Armor.

Ok, roger that.

Here are some ideas I'm going to try (hopefully).

1) Damage.  Instead of allowing the attacker to determine Hit Dice vs Ability Dice damage, I'm going to say any Odd Success damages Hit Dice and any Even Success damages a random (1d6) Ability.   HOWEVER, for the cost of 1 Success the attacker can Narrate a Called Shot and apply the rest of the Successes against any Score he chooses.
---I think this will accomplish 3 things.  a) It reduces the need to worry about whether Hit Dice or Ability Dice hits are "better".  Which is hit will be determined randomly unless a premium is paid for the privelege of selecting the "best" choice.  b) It is a little more familiar to Old School gamers, random hit locations and Called Shots are standard Old School fare, c) it ties back into the concept of using a Success to establish a Fact...in this case the Fact is a Called Shot.

2) Finding Magic Items:  Instead of allowing the player to determine exactly what magic item he wants, I'm going to allow him to search for what power of magic item he wants but leave the stats undefined.  Then:
a) each Success on his roll allows him to name an effect or add a +1 to an effect, b) any remaining effects are defined by the GM.  This also ties back into the standard resolution mechanic, where the player gets to narrate his successes and then the GM fills in the rest.  It also allows for interesting, quirky, or even cursed items to be introduced.

Also, Successes from other rolls can be rolled into the Loot roll in the hopes of getting more successes when searching for a specific artifact.  In this way if enough other Successes can be added in eventually the player will beable to pass the Loot roll with enough Successes to define the item exactly as he wants it.

3) I think Experience Points for Items needs to be reworked.  As it stands (if I'm reading it right) I'm motivated to look for puny items because the more surplus Successes I can rack up the more XPs I get...More XPs for discovering lesser items doesn't seem kosher to me.  I'm thinking the XPs gained should be equal to the value of the Item IF the value of the Item is at least as high as the character's level.


Oh, I also summarized all of the core game mechanic rules onto 5 pages for my own in game reference (a DM's screen as it were).  I have a page for Character Creation and Die Mechanics, a page for using Wealth and Provision Saves, a Page for Combat, a Page for Magic, and a Page for Experience and Treasure.

If you'd like to see it, I'd be happy to pass it on.

Here's hoping I have enough time (between days spent moving my old apartment) to play a session.   I'm really looking forward to it.

Quote from: Valamir
1) Damage.  Instead of allowing the attacker to determine Hit Dice vs Ability Dice damage, I'm going to say any Odd Success damages Hit Dice and any Even Success damages a random (1d6) Ability.

I found that choosing the Ability Score works really well. Hint: Always take out Adroitness. It gives the players a sense of accomplishment and choice. I like this.

One suggestion, Clinton, would be to give monsters preferred Ability Scores they like to damage. So a brain eater would most likely hit Cerebrality, or a withering git would hit Adroitness. Default would be Hit Dice.

As for the magic items, I'm not much at gamist strategy in roleplaying, so I didn't pay much attention to trying to get XP. It was more like "Heck, I need to up my Dodge, so I'm looking for a Brooch of Defense +1"

Ralph,

As always - great, great comments. Here's my thoughts:

Quote from: Valamir
1) Damage.  Instead of allowing the attacker to determine Hit Dice vs Ability Dice damage, I'm going to say any Odd Success damages Hit Dice and any Even Success damages a random (1d6) Ability.   HOWEVER, for the cost of 1 Success the attacker can Narrate a Called Shot and apply the rest of the Successes against any Score he chooses.
---I think this will accomplish 3 things.  a) It reduces the need to worry about whether Hit Dice or Ability Dice hits are "better".  Which is hit will be determined randomly unless a premium is paid for the privelege of selecting the "best" choice.  b) It is a little more familiar to Old School gamers, random hit locations and Called Shots are standard Old School fare, c) it ties back into the concept of using a Success to establish a Fact...in this case the Fact is a Called Shot.

I see the appeal of this. I'll think on it. I really like your comments further above, though, where the roll to resist damage is Wherewithal + skill + armor (not counting Hit Dice.) That's actually going straight in the rules.

Quote
2) Finding Magic Items:  Instead of allowing the player to determine exactly what magic item he wants, I'm going to allow him to search for what power of magic item he wants but leave the stats undefined.  Then:
a) each Success on his roll allows him to name an effect or add a +1 to an effect, b) any remaining effects are defined by the GM.  This also ties back into the standard resolution mechanic, where the player gets to narrate his successes and then the GM fills in the rest.  It also allows for interesting, quirky, or even cursed items to be introduced.

Again - I like it, but want to think on it. I forgot to add the rules for cursed items, actually. The player can call for a rate of curse - each die of curse is -1 die on the loot roll. The DM determines the curse.

Quote
3) I think Experience Points for Items needs to be reworked.  As it stands (if I'm reading it right) I'm motivated to look for puny items because the more surplus Successes I can rack up the more XPs I get...More XPs for discovering lesser items doesn't seem kosher to me.  I'm thinking the XPs gained should be equal to the value of the Item IF the value of the Item is at least as high as the character's level.

The reason for the XP rule is this - the less of an item you get, the more XPs you get. It's a trade-off: do I want the more powerful item or the experience? It's not "realistic" at all - but a very good balancing rule. That said, your idea works really well with the rules above you suggested.

Quote
Oh, I also summarized all of the core game mechanic rules onto 5 pages for my own in game reference (a DM's screen as it were) ... If you'd like to see it, I'd be happy to pass it on.

Please do.

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
I see the appeal of this. I'll think on it. I really like your comments further above, though, where the roll to resist damage is Wherewithal + skill + armor (not counting Hit Dice.) That's actually going straight in the rules.

Ok, I'll play that way then :-)  I'll probably just assume the monsters in your scenario have Armor=Hit Dice to avoid haveing to recreate them all, unless I managed to scrape together the time somewhere.

I think this will allow monsters to be weakened just enough (by having to spread dice around more to buy armor seperately) to make them more suitable opponents.  Rather than a level 1 monster being *equal* to a level 1 character, it will be slightly inferior (because characters don't have to spend dice to get armor) thus, PC's should be able to win the fight against a equal opponent.  Making battles more challenging then becomes the simple matter of throwing in more beasties in tried and true dungeon hack tradition.

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
Again - I like it, but want to think on it. I forgot to add the rules for cursed items, actually. The player can call for a rate of curse - each die of curse is -1 die on the loot roll. The DM determines the curse.

Absolutely, these are just some ideas that occurred to me that may or may not work as envisioned.  My goal here was two fold 1) prevent the fortune of a great roll from allowing a player to fully design an absolutely mac piece of equipment.  Based on what effects the player picks the GM can then add effects that compliment without being uber.  2) tie into the basic resolution rule of "Player Narrates Success - DM Narrates the Rest."  In this case the player's Successes are defining Facts about the item, the remainder of which are up to the DM to define.

That Cursed rule should work well.

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
The reason for the XP rule is this - the less of an item you get, the more XPs you get. It's a trade-off: do I want the more powerful item or the experience? It's not "realistic" at all - but a very good balancing rule. That said, your idea works really well with the rules above you suggested.

Ahhh, you're right.  Not very "realistic" but might be a powerful game tool.  May help with the possibility of players looting every body looking for Uber Item on the theory they'll roll killer eventually.  With this rule, there's a motivation to forgo searching for Uber Item in order to Level Up faster.  Ok, I'm convinced...I'll play it that way.

On the other hand, as you mention, using my idea for shared item creation has its own built in motivator against searching for Uber Items...that being, the lower power the item, the more likely you'll have extra successes to define it how you like.

Probably be worth testing both ways.

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
Please do.

I'll be away from my home computer till Monday, but I'll certainly send it to you then.



Couple more things I came up with:

1) Revisting the Carrying Capacity idea: I'm thinking maybe just using the actual Vir 3-18 score as CC.  Encomberance is then simply Armor Rating + Weapon Rating + Wealth Carried + Provisions Carried + 1 per Item Carried.  Every 3 points that your Encomberance exceeds your CC is a -1 to Initiative.  Simple, and I like the idea of players scratching their heads wondering if they should dump Provisions in order to carry more wealth.

2) On a related note, maybe the Wealth successfully brought back to town should equate to XPs in true AD&D fashion.  This would be another potential motivator to searching for Wealth over items...especially since Wealth appears to be largely disposable.

3) Far too early to call this a concern (not having played yet) but its something I noticed when tossing some dice in practice (and something I noticed when playing Sorcerer using similar mechanics).  I'll call it an issue I'll keep my eye on, but some of your comments on tweaking difficulties down make me think you ran into the same thing in your games.

Namely:  the die mechanics seem geared to not produce multiple successes very often.  2-3 successes seem to be uncommon and more seem down right rare.  This is perfectly fine for situations where 1 Success is "success" and more are "dramatic / critical success".  However, my worry is that it may not work as effectively given that your rules seem to desire generating multiple successes frequently (Combat Successes to Damage and Gathering Spell Points especially).

In other words, will the die mechanics produce frequent enough multiple successes to "power" big time hits and big time spells reliably?

6 Dice vs 6 Dice is a 50/50 shot at succeeding at all.  But I would estimate that the probability of more than 1 success drops off dramatically, producing a very steep and narrow curve (i.e. low standard deviation).  My 2 years of statistics classes eons ago doesn't leave me with the tools to actually calculate out these probabilities...Mike H: can you do some number crunching on this? [/i]

Ok. I wrote the previous post late, late last night, and was barely concious. This morning, here's the thoughts I'm having:

Combat and Damage

I originally had the roll to resist damage equal to Wherewithal + Hit Dice + skill + armor. I chose this because I assumed most characters (or creatures) would have an attack skill of some sort, and as they rose in character level, you needed something to balance against their damage (Hit Dice.)

This was bad, bad math. The balance here is an increasing active dodge (i.e. parry - Adr + attack skill) or passive dodge (Adr + dodge skill). If you have neither of the above - well, you're screwed anyway.

Your successes from this roll that roll over into damage should stay roughly the same as you go up in level if you're fighting creatures of your same level. Your damage modifiers will not go up except through magic weapons, or if you have a damage skill (not unusual, but not highly likely, either.)

So, I now think Wherewithal + skill + armor should be enough for that roll. This also lets me eliminate the inane "fake damage" rule I had to make up to compensate for the fact that some creatures just couldn't be hurt.

My problem with this is that it makes Hit Dice a misnomer. You're not rolling these dice for anything. So - my suggested change is that you can actually spend Hit Dice. You can strain your body past its limits and trade 1 Hit Die for a die added to any roll. (Please comment on this part. Is good? Should I extend it to trade X Hit Dice for X dice added to any roll?)

Thinking about how damage works - I like all the above suggestions, but here's my idea:

Damage is first applied against Hit Dice, always. When Hit Dice reach zero, damage is applied to an ability score (probably chosen randomly).

However, you can make a "called shot," hitting whatever ability score you want at any time. You will have to spend 2 damage dice for each point of damage you want to do (frex, if you do 4 damage, they could all apply to Hit Dice, or 2 damage to whatever ability score you choose.)

Once you reach 0 Hit Dice, you must roll Wherewithal + any sort of "staying up" skill versus Difficult (6 dice) before any action in combat, or pass out. (After combat, you can continue to move on, as long as you attempt nothing strenuous.) This applies to creatures and characters alike, making the rules to pass out equal to both of them instead of being different.

(Again, please comment. Is good? I'm flying by the seat of my pants here.)

Lastly, healing. Healing using these rules will no longer be an automatic thing. In the games I've run, I noticed that (a) healing Hit Dice happened quickly, but (b) ability score damage was awful, remaining until the next step of the dungeon.

Instead, in each scene, you can make a Wherewithal + any healing skill roll versus the amount of damage you have total. Successes are damage removed, starting with Hit Dice, and then ability scores. (Like above, you can spend 2 successes to heal whatever you want.) This makes light wounds heal quickly, but heavy damage may be totally unhealable without help. (Someone with a Healing Others skill could roll Dis + Healing Others against your current damage. These successes would roll into your Healing roll.)

Opponents

I think this will allow monsters to be weakened just enough (by having to spread dice around more to buy armor seperately) to make them more suitable opponents.

They basically already do. Natural armor or weapons are treated as skills, which take up a skill slot and take up dice.

Treasure

I like both sets of rules. Urg. I like my original rules for their XP vs. treasure balance, but I like yours for system integrity - the 1 success = 1 fact rule still applies. I think I'm going to go with your proposed change, actually, and discard XP's for magic items. This rule will also help the DM balance the characters - one guy can't get the +4 Sword, and the +4 Initiative Ring, and the +4 to Damage Ogre Gloves. The DM's narration will balance the items.

As for cursed items - I think I'll still let the player mention that beforehand - frex, "I'm looking for a 6 die item, with 2 dice of curse." (An item that would fit this description is a Broadsword (2 normal dice of damage) with a 'Burst into Flame 2' magic skill, and a 'Set Random Things on Fire 2' curse.)

Carrying Capacity

The 3-18 scores have been dropped, so that won't work. Outside of that - nope. I hate the idea of encumberance in any game, and I want to keep this simple. Plus, I like the idea of walking around with an assload of stuff.

I think I will use this simple rule, though - dice of armor greater than your Virility (that aren't magical) subtract from all Adroitness based rolls. Frex, if you have a Virility of 2 and 4 die plate mail, subtract 2 from all Adroitness based rolls. This also makes Virility more useful, which it's strangely not in Donjon.

Mechanics and number of successes

I have noticed that the large dice used have kept successes down. It's really been a sort of "when it rains, it pours" system, though - you might go for a couple of actions with 1 or 2 successes on each roll, and then the DM rolls 10 as his highest die - and you suddenly have 8 successes or something.

This is really fine with me - outside of Gathering Spell Dice (which I modified to work), one or two successes is all the player needs - I don't want them giving 7 facts about every situation. I should run some rudimentary math on it, though.

Obligatory gangsta comment

Damn. Game pimpin' be hard, mofo.

Actually the sorcerer mechanic is rather complicated statistically (what with the possibility of the high die being equal). So what I have below are the results of a practical test of 5,000 rolls.

Six dice vs. six dice
Successes  Result
1              55%
2              27%
3              12%
4              4%
5              1%
6              .1%

Note: This does not indicate how many of these were "Total Successes". Even one success could be a total success if five higher pairs of dice match.

Anyhow, this bears out what Ralph was saying. I was trying to think of ways to ameliorate the effect. One would be to not "discard" tied dice. This results in a slight shift. Even better is to capture the opponents tied dice. So on a 5,4,2 vs a roll of 5,5,3 the latter roll would win with not just one success but with three (one for the regular success, and two for the captured tied high pair). Still this only changes things slightly.

Six dice vs. six dice
Successes  Result
1              45%
2              23%
3              18%
4              8%
5              4%
6              1%
7+            1%

Still very slanted towards one success. For a much broader curve you might try something like the following. Compare each set of dice starting with the each rollers highest. Ties are captured by the next comparison winner. Each compared set won counts as a success for the first character to get them. A successful comparison by the other character thereafter serves to stop the comparisons. Comparisons against an opponent out of dice count as successes. For example, 9,7,5,3,1 vs 9,8,6,2 results in four successes for the latter roller (two for the captured pair, and one each for the next two comparisons). 9,7,5,3,1 vs. 8,6,5,2 results in six successes for the first roller (One for each successful comparison including comparing the 1 vs no opposing die, and two for the captured pair).

Kinda complicated, but it gives you an idea of the sort of thing that you can do to adjust the mechanic away from producing results of one.

On a different note, what you have above means that, more or less, Hit Dice are now Hit Points? Hmmm. That seems to violate the nature of the game. How about doing away with them altogether? Instead, a character just takes either ability damage (perhaps at -2 per damage) or a -1 penalty die on all actions due to injury. Or, in other words a wound is just an ability penalty that applies to all abilities. Or perhaps a wound also incurs an ability damage that makes it unique. So a leg wound might reduce all rolls by one and combat rolls a further one (but only one die penalty for knot tying). Anyhow, just say a character is unconcious at -5, dying at -7 and dead at -10 or something. Rest restores these dice. Something like that.

Work this in with armor and soaking in general. Keep track of the number of successes on the "to hit" roll. For each that does not result in a wound after the damage roll do an ability penalty instead. This is the result of outmaneuvering, unbalancing, blunt force trauma, etc, whatever the player wants to describe it as.

Also, if using Valamir's encumberance penalties, allow the player to take the penalties accumulated as whatever combination of Initiative or Adr penalties they want (it taking an adr penalty, then they still roll full adr for Initiative purposes). This will help to balance out armor, and would work well with the idea above.

I know, all probably not dungeony enough. But just some ideas I had.

Mike

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
Combat and Damage
...
So - my suggested change is that you can actually spend Hit Dice.
...

Damage is first applied against Hit Dice, always. When Hit Dice reach zero, damage is applied to an ability score (probably chosen randomly).
...
(Again, please comment. Is good? I'm flying by the seat of my pants here.)

I love the spending Hit Dice (1 Hit Die = 1 die to roll, or possibly even 1 auto success).

I don't like the Damage first applied against Hit Dice. I really enjoyed the choice to injure my opponent. I don't want to see the currency change from 1 Damage Success = 1 Die of Damage to 2 Damage Successes = 1 Die of Ability Damage.

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
Healing using these rules will no longer be an automatic thing.
...

As a player, I enjoyed the automatic healing. I'd rather not have to make a roll to heal. I think the player should get the choice to heal 1 Hit Die or 1 Ability Score per scene. Period. Adheres to the KISS principle of game design. This means, if you stagger your combat and non-combat encounters, people will generally heal 2 points between encounters.

Again, I don't like the 2 successes = 1 die of something. Ruins the elegant currency.

I agree with not having encumbrance, but instead of subtraction to figure an Adroitness penalty, howabout you simply can't wear armor greater than your Virility? This would mean that you could get Plate Mail all you want, but it won't go past your Vir. And heck, no subtraction needed.

I also like the idea of 1 success = 1 magic item fact. Keeps the currency & "fact" mechanic. I think Donjon's fact mechanic is the coolest thing evAR. When we were playing, I said, "I want a um, ring or something that gives me a +1 to Dodge. No, it shouldn't be a ring. Howabout a brooch?"

Instead, it would've been rolling dice and then, "2 facts? +1, affects Dodge" and Clinton would've been on the spot to give me bracers or boots or a nosering or something.

I gots to disagree with you, Zak. There isn't a currency change - you're spending one of your successes to state a fact. That said, 2 damage successes for 1 die of ability damage is steep - I think I'll change it to Valamir's earlier suggestion of 1 damage die to state where it's going, and then the rest of the dice apply against that. So, if you did 3 dice of damage, you could spend one to designate Adroitness and then do 2 damage to it.

Hit Dice is just the default if you don't spend anything.

As for the healing - I'll think it over again. If it's automatic, it'll be Hit Dice first, then ability scores.

Ah. When you put it that way, 1 success = 1 fact = 1 die.  Then you get: 1 success = Ability fact, subsequent successes = dice of damage. I like it. Way to go, Valamir!

Quick note only because I'm rushing out to my plane.  I REALLY hope I can get my old crew to play so I'll have some real stuff to report.

1) Love the Spending Hit Dice for Strain.

2) Not sure I like the Hit Dice first then Abilities.  I'll have to read it closer but it seems that you'd never do Ability hits against monsters since they're down and 0 Hit Dice.

3) Agree that 2 Successes per Ability damage breaks the currency flow, glad you liked my 1 Success = Fact for a Called Shot idea.

4) Not sure about Healing rolls rather than automatic.  Probably actually need to play this one out to see.  On the one hand automatic is quick easy and painless.  On the other hand a roll would tie healing into the standard mechanic and allow things like a Troll's "Regeneration" skill to seamlessly integrate into the normal Healing rules.  Have to ponder that one deeper than I have time to here.

5) Encombrance Idea.  Funny thing, what got me thinking along those lines is recognizing that Virulity wasn't all that important in DK...since a high Adr also helps boost damage.  My first idea was just with armor, then I thought, why not include other stuff too.  With a high enough value you can still carry tons of stuff but it means the wimpy little wizard can't carry as much as the big strong barbarian.
       I think I'd go with an Initiative penelty before an Adroitness penelty, though.  An Adoitness penelty would negate the armor bonus on Damage Resistance rolls making heavy armor useless for all but the very strong...which in "reality" it wasn't.  

More on Monday, see you all then.

Quote from: Valamir
2) Not sure I like the Hit Dice first then Abilities.  I'll have to read it closer but it seems that you'd never do Ability hits against monsters since they're down and 0 Hit Dice.

Valamir -

Doubt you'll see this, but re-read this from my previous post:

Once you reach 0 Hit Dice, you must roll Wherewithal + any sort of "staying up" skill versus Difficult (6 dice) before any action in combat, or pass out. (After combat, you can continue to move on, as long as you attempt nothing strenuous.) This applies to creatures and characters alike, making the rules to pass out equal to both of them instead of being different.

Here's where ability damage really comes in.

Talking to Clinton on the phone right now, and I wanted to get this suggestion down in stone:

A character who puts on armor can only benefit from as many Armor points as they have Virility. Examples:

Zog (Vir 3) and Dainty (Vir 1) find Chain Mail (AC 2).

Zog can wear the Chain Mail no problem. He gets the full AC bonus. Dainty puts on the Chain Mail, but only gets an AC 1 bonus (because his Vir is 1, that's his AC max).

This makes me wonder if it would work fine for weapons, too. Zog can heft a massive Warhammer (Dam 3), but Dainty can only use it to cause 1 point of damage.

This would encourage Dainty to find all sorts of magic items (which are immune to these rules), and Zog will probably stick with brutal, mundane war mauls and stuff.

Just a thought. I know this doesn't affect Adroitness in any way, but we're not that Sim anyway :) In fact, if there was a good way to tie in To Hit & Damage into one roll, I'd probably be all over it.

Zak,

I like half of your post (I'm shocked we're posting and talking on the phone at the same time. Crazy.)

I still like the idea of armor above your Vir limits your Adr. (Vir 2 wearing Scale Mail 3 means Adroitness is penalized by 1.) The idea of just an initiative penalty was raised above, and I like that, but also like the idea that heavy-ass armor keeps you from dodging, swimming, running, and the like.

I think your idea about weapons is awesome, though - you can't use a weapon with a damage rating higher than your Virility. We could do one of two things:

a) Cap the damage at your Virility. The problem here is that each point of Virility starts to equal two points. If you have a Vir of 2, you can use a 2 point weapon for 4 damage. If you have a Vir of 3, you can use a 3 point weapon for 6 damage.

b) Lower attacks and parries by the offending amount, much like above. If you have a Vir of 2 and try to wield a two-handed monster sword with a damage rating of 5, you would have a -3 penalty to attack or parry with it.

I feel like we're close to a unified-field theory of Donjon Krawl mechanic. There's something to this to hit vs. to damage and armor and weapon stuff. A single mechanic that will make sense.

Kind of like when we look at the character sheet and see: "Dodge (Adr + Skill)", "Damage (Vir + Skill + Weapon)" It just makes sense.

Hmm ... so, yeah, I dig the "No bonus higher than ABILITY" for things. But I also like the "Adroitness affected by heavy armor." I just can't reconcile the fact that Armor is the ONLY place in the ENTIRE game where we do this funky thing.

But then, why are we only counting encumberance for armor? Why not weapons? Or gear? I still like the Adroitness thing, but I'm not sure about how to factor it in.

Maybe Armor should have a Die Total. You get X dice (up to your Virility) for your Resist Damage. The left over points are your Adroitness penalty. I guess this is what you've been saying all along, Clinton ... I just like "dividing up points" rather than "subtracting." Subtraction is a dirty word Donjon, as far as I'm concerned.

Or, to word things more Donjon-like: Armor comes with a Value. Assign X dice (up to your Virility) to your Resist Damage (Whe + Skill + Armor). The amount of left-over dice is _an Ability Score loss_ to your Adroitness. So wearing heavy Armor is identical to taking damage to your Adroitness. Only you "heal" the lost Adroitness when you take off the armor.

Yay! I've put it into current Donjon rules-terms! Anyhow, what do you think of the "Heavy armor may cause Adroitness damage" tie-in to the current rules?

I like the Adr penalty for armor, as I've said before. Keep in mind that and Adr penalty will end up resulting in an Initiative penalty as Adr is part of the roll. I like you math Zak. Perhaps state it like this: Vir converts Armor points from Adr penalty to damage save.

Armor should then have a potential treasure stat, then. Call it Armor Bonus or something. So you can have a magic robe with three dice of protection instead of the normal one, but only requiring one Vir to negate any Adr penalties. Similarly, you could define the same item as elfin chain with three dice of protection but lightweight and, therefor only requiring one die of Vir to negate the Adr penalties.

Hmmm.. this is even better. I would then say that all stuff carried has a potential Adr penalty. The Adr penatly that has to be converted is equal to the dice in the object minus two. So two die leather has negligible weight, while four die has a potential of one die penalty. Same with a big sword. A 2 die shortsword has no penalty but a 3 die broadsword has a one penalty. Same with provisions, etc. Anyhow, Vir can be used to negate any of these penalties, but against their total. So a 3 Vir adventurer could use the chainmail, and broadsword and carry 3 dice of provisions for a total of 3 dice of penalty all negated by his 3 dice of Vir (Note: weapons and armor picked up but not in use should add to the equipment pool using the exponential method; a 3 pool plus a 3 sword = 4; a 3 pool plus a 5 sword = 5; the Adr penalty could be assessed this way for players who don't mind the slight added complexity)

You could even allow for the penalties to be less universal. For example, an overloaded character can choose the penalty that they want for the round. So a 3 Vir character with a total of 4 penalty points would have to decide where to apply the one that they are not able to negate. If that was caused by armor and weapon equally, he could choose to only have the penalty apply to attacks one round and defense the next (representing concentrating on either using the sword well, or staying mobile).

Just some more ideas.

Mike

My vote's in for only having armor apply to Adr penalties. Less bookwork for everyone.

And magic items (as far as I know ... Clinton?) don't provide the Adr penalties. All the more reason to get them. Otherwise, everyone's facts will go to lightweight things, and you won't often get Plate Mail +4 for the Paladin of Azathos.

We should be holding a Donjon session next weekend (would be this weekend, but it's Valentine's ... I'm taking a 5 day holiday). We're going to try some things out then. We'll probably toy with this whole Adr/Armor thing and see how it works out.

Regarding Adr penalties:

I'm only going to have two things have "weight penalties" or Adr penalties: weapons and armor. This is good, because it makes a magic item that much more powerful balanced against regular items.

Armor works as stated above - all dice of armor above Vir works as Adr penalties. You still get use of the armor. So, if your Vir is 2 and you're wearing 4 dice of armor, that's still 4 dice of protection against damage. Your Adr goes down by 2, though.

With weapons, it works the same, but the penalty only applies to hit. If you have a giant-ass broadsword with 4 dice of damage, and a Vir of 2, you still get 4 dice of damage - but your chance to hit goes down by 2.

Of course, magic bonuses do not apply here. You can have leather armor (2 dice) with 3 more dice of magic protection, and you'll only need Vir 2.

The cool thing about this is that it sometimes makes sense to wear heavy armor or use a heavy weapon - you deal with penalties, but the protection or damage is worth it.

I'm so looking forward to running this again - it's getting better and better.

If you apply this to weapons & armor, though, it really affects weaker characters. My poor archaeologist (who could barely hold his own in combat) wouldn't have been able to weild his weapon very well.

It was high craftsmanship, not heavy weight, that made his weapons effective. With it affecting weapons & armor, the Rapier+Main Gauche (3) would've applied a 2-point penalty to hit and only a 1 point bonus to damage. I'd have been better off using a Rapier+Main Gauche (1). Or I would have started looking for a magical one.

Maybe this should be a Dial? High-magic settings should have weapons & armor count against Adr to encourage people looking for magic items?

First - dude, you're misreading again. It would have applied a 2 die penalty to hit, and given 3 dice to damage, being a 3 die weapon.

That said - it affects weaker characters in that they can't use big stuff. That's totally fine - it's a trade-off you have to make. If I have a Vir of 1 and an Adroitness of 5, I'll just wear leather armor and carry a dagger. I'll have 5 dice minimum to dodge attacks, and have 5 dice + combat skill to hit, so I should have a lot of successes (which I can roll over into damage.)

If I'm the opposite way, with 5 dice in Vir and 1 in Adr, I'll only have 1 die to dodge (unless I have a skill), and 1 + weapon skill to hit. I'll want that plate mail and two-handed sword so that when I get hit, the armor will stop the damage, and when I actually do hit, it'll count.

Plus, if you're making a character like your archaelogist (who concentrated on magic), use your magic. That's the point.

So then "masterwork" items should be considered magic items, then. Or something. Because a Rapier/Main Gauche (3) is going to be no heavier than a (1).

And yeah, good point about the magic. At first level, I found that it was either a) super-effective or b) not effective or detrimental (which led to the awesome "you resurrected a skeleton, but it's now attacking its creator!")

I wonder if the magic system should be tuned up a little more (as in, more dice to roll or something). I'll have to play up the magic aspect next time, to further test it out.

Zak,
Yes, masterwork or magic it should all cost the same. Very Hero System, that.

As to the magic armor and weapons: that's a huge benefit making them entirely without weight penalty. I like Zak's old Fungeon rules for building up from a base item. So that +4 plate should encumber just like regular plate. As to everyone finding light items, well an item can be both. So, a particular player might create +4 plate, +2 light. Takes a lot of successes to get it, but it's available. See where I'm going now? It's really the same thing. In the end you have a protection and an encumberance. The advantage is the disparity between the two.

Mike

As much as I hesitate to bring Fungeon into Donjon (they are weird sibilings, but very, very different in execution) ... the "build up from a base" idea is a good one.

I wonder if there's a way to reconcile magic vs. ordinary items? That way there's ONE mechanic for getting loot. You start out with the base fact ("I want a sword (1)") and embellish ("with my two other rolled facts, it's a sword (1) + (1) but also light (1)"). Then the GM runs with it ("You find a masterwork bastard sword (2, enc 1) engraved with the name of Ortok the Bold. You'd better hope this Ortok is long dead.")

Maybe weapons & armor, then, should have two stats: Value and Encumberance. In most cases, they're the same (written as (X)), but in some cases, they're different (written as (X, enc Y))?

This would be fun for cursed items, too. "You have found a dagger infused with dense Heavyium. It's the Black Dagger of Krob (2, enc 4)"

(aside: I noticed that Fungeon's acknowledgements missed Clinton and Donjon. That was unfair and has been fixed.)

Quote from: Mike Holmes
As to the magic armor and weapons: that's a huge benefit making them entirely without weight penalty.

That's something Zak said - not correct. 3 die scale mail with +2 magic protection is still 3 encumberance.

Here's the Grand Unified Theory of Donjon items:

Regular weapons and armor have a rating for Damage (Dam) or Damage Protection (DP).

If a character uses armor with a DP higher than his Virility, his Adroitness suffers a penalty for each die of DP higher than Virility.

Example: A character with Vir 3 wearing plate mail (DP 4) suffers a one die penalty to Adr. He still receives 4 DP from the armor.

If a character uses a weapon with Dam higher than his Virility, his roll to hit with the weapon suffers a penalty for each die of DP higher than Virility. (Note: I'm removing that whole business about sharpness doing +1 damage, and increasing all damages by one. A big sword works as well as a big mace.)

Example: A character with Vir 2 using a two-handed sword (Dam 4) suffers a 2 die penalty to his roll to hit. He still does Vir + Dam + successes damage with the sword if he hits.

An item can be magic. All bonuses to an item because of magic do not increase the weight of the item. A dagger (with Dam 1) with a +3 to Dam because of magic still weighs only one die. Chain mail (DP 2) with 2 dice protection from damage still weighs one two dice.

Getting items

Any fact stated by the GM in combat is a free fact for the player when looting for items. If it's already established that an opponent has a sword, then the player can automatically find a sword on him. If the GM made the sword burst into flame during the combat, it can still burst into flame.

A player states the difficulty of the item he is looking for when looting a body, and also states how many curse dice it will have. An item is built from loot dice - the difficulty stated above - and costs are:

- magic ability score bonus - 4 dice (Example: +1 to Cerebrality is 4 dice)
- general magic bonus - 2 dice (Example: +2 to attack is 4 dice)
- specific magic bonus - 1 die (Example: +3 to attack undead is 3 dice)
- one time magic bonus - 1 die (Example: potion with Healing 5 is 5 dice)
- regular quality - 1 die (Example: a short sword (Dam 2) is 2 dice)
- magic curse - -1 die (Example: -2 to parry is -2 dice)

The player rolls the Loot Rating of the opponent (its level) minus the number of magic items he already has, and the DM rolls the difficulty stated by the player earlier. If the player is unsuccessful, nothing is found (or the basic facts stated during the combat are found, as mentioned above.) If the player is successful, he can allocate as many dice as he had successes. This can be either loot dice or curse dice. You can make your own curse, and leave the loot dice in the hands of the GM.

Example 1: Jim's character kills a Level 10 Ork War-chief. Jim says, "I'm going to loot for a 6 dice item." (Jim has no other magic items.) Jim rolls 10 dice, and the GM rolls 6. Jim gets 3 successes and says, "Ok - I find a dagger (1 die) with a quality of Strike Quickly 1 (2 dice - +1 to initiative)." The DM has 3 dice to allocate and decides that the ring also has the quality of Sense Humans 3 (3 dice - specific magic quality.)

Example 2: Jim's been fighting another Level 10 Ork War-chief, but this one pulled out a wicked serrated bastard sword (Dam 4). Jim says, "I'm looting that sword - I'm trying for 4 dice." Jim rolls 9 dice (10 - his one magic item) and the GM rolls 4 dice. Jim gets 5 successes, but was only trying for a 4 dice item, so that's all he can allocate. He says, "Ok - the sword has Burst Into Flame 2 (4 dice - adds 2 to damage)." He automatically got the sword, and had to spend no dice on that.

Example 3: Jim's fighting yet another Level 10 Ork War-chief. This one was wearing a chain shirt, and it gave him magical protection at 2 dice. Jim says, "I want that shirt - I'm going for 6 dice on it, but with 4 dice of curse." Jim rolls 8 dice (10 - his 2 magic items) and the GM rolls 2 dice (6 - 4 curse dice.) Jim gets 4 successes, and states "I want a quality of Ork Strength (+1 to Vir - 4 dice)." The GM uses the other two loot dice to up the magical protection 1 to 3, and uses the 4 curse dice for a quality of Ork Brutishness (-1 to Soc - 4 dice).

Does all this make sense?

Can I call a dagger +2 a super light broadsword instead? Ifin I wantsta? Or a somewhat light somewhat sharp shortsword? Puhleeeeese, uncle Clinty?

Mike

Mike,

Sure thing. It's just another magic quality. In fact, I'd rule it's specific. (I'll show you why below.)

Broadsword (3 dice) + Lightness 2 (specific - 2 dice) = 5 dice.
Dagger (1 die) + Damage 2 (4 dice) = 5 dice.

Perfect-o.

Ok, I found a computer to log into...Yeah!

1) Yeah, you're right Clinton, in my hurried read, I missed what you actually said.  So, if you want to do a Called Shot you use a Success / Fact and hit what you like.  If you don't you default to HD hits.  So Zak's desire to have the power to choose his hits is still in place, you just have to pay an extra Success to do it.  Since multiple successes are not super common, if you really want to do this you'd better come up with some ingenious bonus carry overs and work on nailing some RP bonuses in order to rack up the extra dice...I like it.


2) With regards to the Roll to remain concious however, I have some suggestions.  (Tangental note: I humbly suggest changing the names of the Saves to something less tongue in cheek like Mind Save and Body Save).
a) I'd have the roll to keep going once HDs hit 0 use the standard Body Save.  This way there's no need to create a new formula to remember (applicable skills always apply anyway).
b) I'd only make the Save check for each time you take damage while your HDs are 0  NOT for every action.  Otherwise the rule is nothing but delaying the inevitable.

QUESTION:  Do saves decline with damage?  I'd think not since they can be bought up independently.  They merely start at a value equal to the attribute in question, but do not increase and decrease with that attribute.  Otherwise the bookkeeping could get a little cumbersome.  If Saves ARE effected by damage then they should be recorded as Dis+Save or Whe+Save (where Save is the additional amount the Save's been bought up for).

c) If Saves do decrease with damage then I'd have the Save be Vs whatever the damage of the current blow is.  If Saves do not then I'd have the Save be vs the total Ability Hits the character is suffering from.


3) With regards to healing, I like the concept of the healing roll but practically I don't know if you'd want EVERY character to be making a roll EVERY scene.  Plus, the number of failed rolls with the rolls that earn extra successes will probabably wash out to something around 1 per scene anyway.  
    Therefor I'd go with the 1 die recovered per scene as just being alot easier.  Plus, with the rule that HD have to be healed first you still have the lingering Ability hits without needing the Ability hits heal 1 per level rule.  This also motivates the DM to balance the Hits out.  Want to slam a character with some nasty Ability Hits?  Better be sure to back it up with some HD hits to keep them from being recovered right away.
    I'd reserve the Healing Roll for extra healing like magic, Troll Regen, Laying on of hands, etc.
    Also:  I've taken to refering to the 20-1 Initiative Countdown as a Combat Flurry.  I think the end of one of these flurries would be a good time to have an automatic Heal.  The lull in the fighting is a perfect time to catch ones breath and divides the combat into essentially 2 scenes. I'd also use the 20-1 Flurry to time spell durations that are for 1 "combat".

4) The encomberance and Armor question.  The one big negative I'm seeing is that you're essentially saying a person has to have maximum strength in order to use Full Plate effectively.  I don't find that to be particularly "realistic" or a good game construct.  Plus Adroitness penelties are particularly harsh.  They nail your to-hit, they nail your defense, and indirectly they nail both the damage you sustain and the damage you dish out.  They also nail your initiative which translates to ANOTHER hit to all of the above due to losing actions.
(Tangental Note: given the HUGE impact of Adroitness you may wish to consider adding a seperate Reflex Stat to drive the defensive moves.)

    Perhaps instead of being a penelty based on strait difference, it should be one based on multiples.  Thus At Virility 3, wearing Armor 5 is only -1 instead of -2 and encomberance of 9 would be only -2 instead of -6.
    I'd also like to see Wealth and Provisions be applied.  I agree you don't want to make it complicated, but Carry Capacity is very old school.  Armor + Wealth + Provisions + 1 per Item is pretty simple math.  I really like the idea of my barbarian being able to haul more loot than your pansy elf.  Besides think of all of the really cool spell effects that puny caster can come up with to help him carry stuff.  Who here has NOT used a bag of holding, a portable hole, or a Tensors Floating Disk to carry heinous amounts of stuff.  Thats classic dungeon crawling.
    Then you can start throwing in optional rules for those of us who get off on arranging the Diablo inventory screen to maximize carrying.  The ubiquitous Large Sacks, and Back Packs.  A simple capacity whose effect is to 1/2 the Encomberance of Wealth or Provisions carried in them.  Further a roll would be required (Cer vs current capacity) in order to recover stuff quickly from the container in an emergency.
    For Weapons, I'd go with an Initiative penelty rather than a to-hit penelty.  You mention taking a bigger weapon for a lower chance to hit but more damage...but given the carry over effect a lower chance to hit also means less damage, partially cancelling out the damage advantage.  With an Initiative penelty you'd have the same chance to hit, just fewer possible attacks.  You'd also have fewer chances to parry but that also would seem reasonable if you're wielding a sword thats far too big.

QUESTION:  If I have Chain Mail +1 does it have 0 Encomberance because its magic or does it still have an Encomberance of 2 for being chain but the extra protection is free of weight?


5)  New Item:  Shields.  I'd assume that shield use is some kind of skill, but is it a defense skill or is it a damage resistance skill.  If a defense skill it would have to be a passive defense skill (because as an Active defense it would be a waste of a slot as you can simply use your regular combat skill for that).  I'm thinking that Shields could be rated just like armor and weapons with this rating being the number of passive defenses per Combat Flurry you can make with that shield.  
    This begs the question then of why I'd take a shield instead of a dodge which isn't so limited.
a) don't worry about rating shields thats just too "sim" if you have the skill you can just use it...of course you still have to HAVE a shield while a dodge you don't need to have anything so there is still the question.
b) don't require a shield to be a seperate skill.  Define a shield as simply allowing you to use your combat skill passively "X" number of times per flurry where the X is the shield rating.  This works well, except some combat skills aren't really suitable for automatic shield use.
c) give shields some additional advantage like being used for BOTH Defense and Damage Resistance at the players option with each use using up one of the "ratings".


6) Camping and Fatigue:  Heres an idea that I really think has some potential.  There is no more characteristic scene of an old school hack than camping and setting watches.  What if you could only participate in a number of encounter scenes equal to your Wherewithal before becomeing Fatigued.  Fatigue is simply a -1d6 to all rolls.  You need to stop and rest to recover this fatigue...i.e. Camp.
    Somone in the party makes a Camping roll; Dis + Skill...potentially a standard "Save vs. Camping (perhaps added by various bonus carryovers from other players).  The Difficulty is 3 per Dungeon Level the characters are in.  Failure indicates the Camp was interrupted with the ever popular "ambush during the second watch".  True to the standard rules the DM narrates Facts equal to his successes such as "only the Wizard and Thief are awake" "or the knight has taken his armor off".
     If the roll succeeds:
a) All Fatigue and Caster's Castinging Levels are recovered.
b) Extra Successes can carry over into standard camp type activities like setting traps, sharpening weapons (successes carry over to future damage rolls at 1d6 per till gone), repairing armor (same type rule for simplicity), scrounging, making extra healing rolls, etc.
c) Extra Successes can be used to narrate scouting reports and "look what we found" type discoveries.

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
- magic ability score bonus - 4 dice (Example: +1 to Cerebrality is 4 dice)
- general magic bonus - 2 dice (Example: +2 to attack is 4 dice)
- specific magic bonus - 1 die (Example: +3 to attack undead is 3 dice)
- one time magic bonus - 1 die (Example: potion with Healing 5 is 5 dice)
- regular quality - 1 die (Example: a short sword (Dam 2) is 2 dice)
- magic curse - -1 die (Example: -2 to parry is -2 dice)

Leave it to Clinton to make a whole lot of sense. Sorry I wasn't reading your posts very well! Thanks fro summing things up.

This should be a chart on the character sheet! I think the character sheet should consist of: Character, Currency Chart (1 success = 1 fact = 1 die, type thing), Adventuring Chart (Simple charts for Skill Use, Difficulties, Item Creation, XP Gain, When to Heal, and Combat). The Character needs to have the derived stat algorithms right there on the sheet (Dodge would say "Adr + Skill - Armor" right on the sheet or something).

I love Character Sheets that keep me from asking questions during play :)

Well, I'm finally back in town from my vacation to SF, and I had brought DK down with me to ponder...  Here's some questions that came to me while I was down there....

1) What happens if you roll low enough on stats to get a 0 die bonus?  I know we had spoken on damaging stats down to 0, so that a character can't do a type of action without skill in it?  Does that mean someone is terminally jacked from the get go?

2)  What happens to initiative when someone has a 0 dice bonus for adroitness?

3)  The standard "easy" roll is based off of 3 dice, yet the average dice pool of  a person will be 2 dice... Obviously skilled folks will have a better time at it, but shouldn't 3 dice be average difficulty(you need some skill to have a chance at it)?

4)  In the rare 1 die vs 1 die tie, what happens when that happens to be the xp roll?

5)  Do you get extra xp dice if the situation is a "loaded" encounter(ambush, special tactics, etc)?

6) As you go up in level, it seems that it will already be adjusting to your curve (you are rolling more dice for your character's level, so you need more xp dice to get xp), is increasing the amount of xp per level also necessary?

Just some questions that struck me while travelling,

Chris

Chris,

All good questions.

1) What happens if you roll low enough on stats to get a 0 die bonus?  I know we had spoken on damaging stats down to 0, so that a character can't do a type of action without skill in it?  Does that mean someone is terminally jacked from the get go?

You can't roll a 0 die ability score anymore. I'm not sure you'll roll at all - I'm thinking of excising that rule right out.

2)  What happens to initiative when someone has a 0 dice bonus for adroitness?

It's equal to your level.

3)  The standard "easy" roll is based off of 3 dice, yet the average dice pool of  a person will be 2 dice... Obviously skilled folks will have a better time at it, but shouldn't 3 dice be average difficulty(you need some skill to have a chance at it)?

It's just a terminology thing in this case. I used 3 dice as average difficulty most of the time. I like that it's at least a little hard for most characters, though - I wrote it with the philosophy that if you don't have a skill in something, it's really hard to do - much like the fact that you couldn't do anything at all not stated in your class description in D&D.

4)  In the rare 1 die vs 1 die tie, what happens when that happens to be the xp roll?

Damn. I have no idea.

5)  Do you get extra xp dice if the situation is a "loaded" encounter(ambush, special tactics, etc)?

Yes. That said, it's up to the GM to decide this when writing the encounter.

6) As you go up in level, it seems that it will already be adjusting to your curve (you are rolling more dice for your character's level, so you need more xp dice to get xp), is increasing the amount of xp per level also necessary?

The number of XP doesn't increase. You might be reading (Level x 20) as the total amount you need each level. You only need 20 per Level. If you're level 3, you'll already have 40 XP, and you need (3 x 20) = 60.

What ever happened to the Hit Dice? Last I heard they were going to be a resource ala 7th Sea's experience dice. Does that still stand? What happens to spent dice? How do you get them back?

How about you get to spend any Hit Dice "unwounded" at the beginning of the round once in that combat round (flurry is the term being used in Jared's hackemup game, IIRC). So, if I start a round with six HD and two wounds, then I get four extra dice to use on whatever that round. If I get two more wounds that round then I will only have two HD for the next round.

That makes HD important, but not overwhelming.

Mike

Everyone,

Good suggestions all around, but I think we've hashed this out to the point that further discussion about the same topics confuses the issue. I'm seeing a lot of posts that cover stuff already covered, wrapped, and done. That said, discussion about new issues is great.

Mike - read page 2 of this discussion, near the bottom, for information on Hit Dice.

Valamir - You make a good point with the "roll to stay up" each time you take damage, not each action. I like it. As for the idea of re-naming or re-using saving throws for anything else - they're set as is.

Also - thank you again for your ideas on encumberance. I'm just going to have to go with my gut here and say: I've never enjoyed the idea of encumberance, and never met anyone who has. In addition, the idea of adding up Weapons + Armor + Provisions + Wealth breaks the simplicity of the rules. I want to go more with "what was fun about old school" rather than just "old school."

However - it's a good idea, just not one I intend to use. I'd hang on to it. I am - if I haven't mentioned this before - releasing the rules for Donjon under the OGL. I'm a really big fan of open rule-systems. You will be able to write your own version of Donjon, or a supplement for it for free with no authorization from me. When I do this, I'll make an announcement. I think your idea is an excellent rule for an Advanced Donjon or something like that. (I'm going to make more supplements under the OGL - the first being a treatise on playing goblins of all types. The donjon will be human settlements.)

I think we're starting to argue simulationism here with the Armor penalties. I know I am - the first thing I thought was "of course you can't swim/run/dodge as well in full plate armor, unless you're super-crazy-strong." Here's how this is going to work - I've changed the stats just a little - player characters now start off with 1-6 instead of 0-5. 0 is useless, and I want a 6 point range for ability scores. Because of this, a Vir 5 or 6 character can use Full Plate with no penalties whatsoever, which I think is a pretty good balance.

Shield - hmm. Hadn't even thought about them. (Kind of like missile weapons in the playtest rules.) Here's my initial thought, and it's really simple. Shields give +1 die to all defense, whether it be active or passive. They help with dodging, but also with parrying. This seems realistic in a way, fair, and not overpowering. They have two mundane qualities (Passive Defense 1 and Active Defense 1), so their cost is 2 dice.

Lastly, the idea of camping is great. I'm going to use it, although modified some. Thoughts as of now:

- You don't ever have to camp. You can, though, after any encounter.
- The GM makes a "Camp Difficulty" built into each step of the adventure. (I like your standard 3 x donjon step. Very cool.) The player with the highest Discernment (used for planning a good camp spot, setting up alarms, whatever) + skill rolls versus the difficulty. This difficulty goes up by 1 each time you camp in a step, though.
- Everyone heals one die at the beginning of the camp, of course, just like any scene. If the player is successful, all Magic ratings go back up, and extra successes are used as you mentioned in your post.

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
- The GM makes a "Camp Difficulty" built into each step of the adventure. (I like your standard 3 x donjon step. Very cool.) The player with the highest Discernment (used for planning a good camp spot, setting up alarms, whatever) + skill rolls versus the difficulty. This difficulty goes up by 1 each time you camp in a step, though.

Why not combine it?

Difficulty is 3 x donjon step. Player with highest Discernment + skill rolls. Difficulty goes up by 1 after each roll. Keep rolling until you fail, with each successful roll healing the party (except for the guy on look-out) 1 point.

All it says on page two about Hit Dice is that you can "strain" yourself and get an extra die. I'm assuming that means that Hit Dice used in this manner are "wounded" then? Also, it proposes the idea of using more than one at once, but leaves it up in the air. What's the decision on that? It just seems that one die for wounding yourself is very little bonus. Not that it's broken, though; just seems kinda weak.

Armor encumberance is Gamist as real armor is made so as to cause the least amount of problems possible. A Sim system would have less. What you have is balanced and very gamist, so all goals are met there. I like encumberance, and you've met me. But I can understand not including it as well. Either way works as far as I'm concerned. I will have players make whe rolls occasionally when lifting more than their vir to avoid groin pulls, etc.  :-)

Have you come up with the new rules for chargen using the 1 to 6 stat thing?

As for camping, you forgot the most important part. Save versus provisions or lose a die. No provisions, no rest. This will of course lead to rules about turning slain monsters into provisions, and rolls for taking damage on the way home due to starvation.

Mike

Ok, now I get the xp rule, that's cool.

As far as the encumberance rules etc, I'd avoid making the penalties as part of the rules explicitly.  Simply having the GM knock up the difficulty seems to work well enough.  Frex, you want to swim in plate? ok 9 dice difficulty(or more).  Donjon's simplicity is where it's at.

Also, maybe ability damage should be considered a special attack or skill on its own?   That would encourage players who really want it to get the skill(I can't see someone getting more than one or two skills in it anyway).  This way, you can have the gladiator/hunter skill, Harry and Wear Out, the ninja Pressure Point skill, thief skill Taunt and Enrage(vs.Discernment), etc.

 The only thing I can see for being able to damage any of the ability scores would be"Ancient Pressure Point Jack Move" or something like that for a main skill that would let you target any of the abilities, and would only count as damage dice towards that.

I was also thinking of using Hit Dice to power spells, after my unforunate string in casting.  I like your idea of drawing power for spells to get spell dice to pull it off.  I'm not sure if you want to keep the diminishing magic skill to 0 as the option for limiting magic.  I would say that to continue rolling for more spell dice, perhaps taking another initiative turn("I gotta wait until 5! Crap!") would be a good option, with players having to roll to resist losing concentration when struck.

I ran a friend through a scenario and I noticed how much of a difference specializing a monster makes.  Fighting someone the same level as you is a challenge(which I like), but it seems damn well impossible to beat things that would be 3 or more levels higher than you.  We might have to test this in gameplay.

Chris

Hey, back again.  

Yeah, I figured all those would be optional rules anyway.  Be happy to throw together something for you using the OGL for you to distribute as you like.

Another idea I had was Looting bodies for Provisions instead of wealth.  You might end up eating filet o'swamp rat or something, but it seemed to make sense to me.

One thing I think I'm going to try is making Initiative be Level + Discernment.  The reason is to lesson the impact of Adroitness a little (which is by far and away the most important stat) and increase the value of Dis a bit.  The "Justification" is that Discernment is you ability to spot trouble, recognize what your opponents are trying to do, evaluate opportunities, and make good decisions.  More of a thinking thing than a reflex thing.

Another thing I ran into when practicing creating a couple characters is that Initiative skills like "Crazy Ninja Speed" are very very powerful (perhaps too powerful).

So I got to thinking.  All rolls are Ability + Skill.  Why should Initiative be + two skills.  Essentially for initiative Character Level is the substitute for Skill Level, so there should be no need to add an Initiative Skill to it.  Rather, at the beginning of a flurry you should roll Your Ninja Speed roll against your current Initiative (just like Looting bodies) and carry over any Successes as a bonus to Initiative.

Anyway, thats what I'm gonna try and see how it works.

So I got to thinking. All rolls are Ability + Skill. Why should Initiative be + two skills. Essentially for initiative Character Level is the substitute for Skill Level, so there should be no need to add an Initiative Skill to it. Rather, at the beginning of a flurry you should roll Your Ninja Speed roll against your current Initiative (just like Looting bodies) and carry over any Successes as a bonus to Initiative.

Kick-ass. I love this. I'm writing the game as we speak (which is one reason I've been trying to come to solid conclusions), and will absolutely make sure that no normal skill roll is anything but Ability + Skill.

(What to do with GM successes, though? I wouldn't want to use them as a penalty to initiative. Hrm.)

As far as Adroitness vs. Discernment goes - I don't think that's a bad idea. I think Discernment is more powerful than one would think, though. All the really cool player creation stuff runs off Discernment. When you're looking for trouble, or listening for noise, or whatever, that's when you get to create the most in the game - and they all run off Discernment.

However - creatures don't do this sort of thing, and so for them, Adroitness really is the best ability score. I think your change may make it into the rules - I'll try it out first. It also means fighting dumb creatures is easier than fighting smart creatures, which I like.

Hey - I thought I'd throw this up here, since people asked. Here's the new bit on making attributes (what used to be called ability scores:)

Quote
Each attribute will start with a number between one and six in it. Zero indicates a total lack of ability, three is equivalent to average human ability in an ability, and six is superhuman in nature.

To create your attributes, you will need three six-sided dice (d6's), exactly like you'd find at the corner store or in a game of Monopoly. Roll these dice and look for the median roll. Place this number in your first attribute. Repeat for all six attributes in order.

Example: Jim is rolling the attributes for his character, Logran Thick-heart. His rolls, and the associated attributes look like this:
Roll: 3, 3, 4 = Virility of 3
Roll: 1, 5, 6 = Cerebrality of 5
Roll: 1, 1, 2 = Discernment of 1
Roll: 2, 3, 5 = Adroitness of 3
Roll: 3, 4, 6 = Wherewithal of 4
Roll: 5, 5, 6 = Sociality of 5

Also, I changed the terminology. What used to be an 'ability score' is now an 'attribute' and what used to be a skill is now an 'ability'.

Reason:

Attributes define all living things.
Abilities differ among living things.
Plus, I like it more.

Cool, I like the chargen. For the record, here are the odds of getting a particular score on a roll:

Score  %Chance
1       7.5%
2       18.5%
3       24%
4       24%
5       18.5%
6       7.5%

Every character will likely have one score that is either a six or a one.

Any "unplayable character" rules?

Mike

Hey, just wanted to warn you that my game the C&C uses the same 3d6 take the middle one for stats, and you see a lot of 3's and 4's.  After a couple of games my players complained about it.

You might roll stats and then give everybody a +1 (or a +1 and a -1) to put where they want, just to shake it up a bit.

-Vincent

There are the alternative rules (I call them 'dials' and the finished text is full of them) for either (a) rolling the 3d6 6 times and putting them where you want to, or (b) just distributing 18 dice however you like.

I really like Lumpley's suggestion, though - I'm using that. (Yet another person to add to the credits. :)

Quote from: Clinton R Nixon
So I got to thinking. All rolls are Ability + Skill. Why should Initiative be + two skills. Essentially for initiative Character Level is the substitute for Skill Level, so there should be no need to add an Initiative Skill to it. Rather, at the beginning of a flurry you should roll Your Ninja Speed roll against your current Initiative (just like Looting bodies) and carry over any Successes as a bonus to Initiative.

Kick-ass. I love this. I'm writing the game as we speak (which is one reason I've been trying to come to solid conclusions), and will absolutely make sure that no normal skill roll is anything but Ability + Skill.

(What to do with GM successes, though? I wouldn't want to use them as a penalty to initiative. Hrm.)

Why not use the 1 success = 1 fact currency?  The GM can use those successes to change the flow of combat in interesting ways.  Things like torches setting the curtains on fire, a barrel full of something wet and slippery being knocked on the floor, or the roof of the tunnel groaning and starting to collapse.

-DaR

Quote- magic ability score bonus - 4 dice (Example: +1 to Cerebrality is 4 dice)
- general magic bonus - 2 dice (Example: +2 to attack is 4 dice)
- specific magic bonus - 1 die (Example: +3 to attack undead is 3 dice)
- one time magic bonus - 1 die (Example: potion with Healing 5 is 5 dice)
- regular quality - 1 die (Example: a short sword (Dam 2) is 2 dice)
- magic curse - -1 die (Example: -2 to parry is -2 dice)

Hey Clinton, can this also be used for magical enchantments?  Such as if I want to cast Mighty Strength, would it be 4 spell dice removed from my pool, or 4 successes per die of bonus?  

Chris

Damn, when's the next edition of Donjon Krawl coming out?  I'm really enjoying this discussion and want something I can print out and run!

In the spirit of making a new edition more difficult to produce for poor Clinton, but not too hard, I present:

Clerics and Such Ilk in DJ

For a cleric-type, just make "divine" one of your Magic words.  If you're running a more wickedly inclined party, try "infernal."  If you want a world populated by all kinds of wacky gods, use the gods' name instead.  If the god has preferences about how their followers behave, the other words should be consonant with them.  (Or for a magic-user/cleric mix, just don't put in "bad words" along with a divine spell at the same time.)

Now you can add in all kinds of fun with temples, shrines, holy groves, etc., providing bonuses or penalties to divine entreaties.  Bonus dice for particularly inspired grovelling, self-mortification, and so forth on the part of the priest, paladin, druid, cultist, or whatever.  Stat out the, or a god, carefully as opposed to its tastes and apply bonuses or penalties to the PC's actions.  "Grognak hates elves, like, a lot, and is pleased with you for killing them this combat.  +1 die for your axe attack."  Define gods on the fly with the fact currency!  Aiyeeeee!

Man, it's purely amazing what a good currency does for a game.  I hope this idea doesn't do violence to it.  Feedback is welcome, especially from you lucky dogs playing this thing.

--TQuid

TQuid -

Solid. I'd just been using the magic rules for clerics so far.

Here's my Donjon release date announcement as of now: you'll be able to buy it around the end of March / beginning of April. I know that's a little while to wait, but it's over twice as big as it is now, with tons of examples and clarifying rules and the like - plus incredible art by James V. West.

If if you want to play it before then, man - Vancouver and Seattle aren't that far apart. We can figure something out.